Read the Ben Alexander Interview below and share it on social media.
Please tell our readers who you are and what you do?
My name is Ben Alexander and I am a Norwegian electronica artist and producer. My mother was African, born and raised in Kenya and the Congo, and I was therefore introduced to a lot of experimental music growing up. This led me to start experimenting with my own music and I wanted to create something that was both melodic and rhythmic, but also new and innovative. Since then, I have been working hard to maintain my own unique sound and I hope that my fans appreciate it as much as I do. I hope that people see my music as a new, creative and refreshing contribution to the electronic music enviroment.
Twitter: https://twitter.com/benalexvnder
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/officialbenalexander/
SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/benalexandermusic
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/benalexandermusic
How would you describe your influences and how have they changed over the years?
My taste in music has always been quite broad. I grew up with genres like Hip/Hop, Experimental Music, Pop Music, Lounge Music and others. As a child, I didn't really have one spesific genre or band that I listened to exclusively. Instead, I found excitement in discovering good music across all forms of musical genres.
I was introduced to electronic music later in life, something I quickly fell in love with. Groups like Faithless, Swedish House Mafia, Royksopp, Justice and Daft Punk were my greatest influences at the time and gave me the inspiration to develop the sound I have today. Many of these bands were considered to break limits and create new sounds in popular music, something I respected and was greatly influenced by.
What´s new right now?
I just released my new single "Encore" featuring Norwegian soul vocalist MYRNA along with the music video. It was released Friday the 15th of December.
I wrote this song a long time ago when I met with a great challenge in my personal life. Most of us experience evil or difficulties in our lives from time to time. What matters is how you face them. Encore is about just that. It presents how facing evil with love and strength, rather than giving in to it provides you with courage to overcome it.
With strong lyrics and great melodies, I think Encore is something people will love and hopefully find the inspiration they need to overcome obsticles in life.
Encore – Music Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItwC89abmZM
Encore – SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/benalexandermusic/encore-1
Encore – Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/album/3Gaym3VBJ2YBHF2AEBJffQ
Encore – iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/no/album/encore-single/1315890257
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Are you a superfan of anyone? How did you become a superfan? Do you remember how you become a fan and what turned you into super fan? Have you ever thought about why you´re such a fan?
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What was the biggest mistake you made when you started making music and what would be the number one tip you could give to a newcomer musician?
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How do you get gigs? Can you share any tips?
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Do you have good promotion tips for other musicians?
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Do you have insights on how to grow your audience on soundcloud that you want to share with our audience?
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What has been your biggest challenge right now? Have you been able to overcome that challenge? If so, how?
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How do you personally discover new music?
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Once you discovered new music, do you tell others about the new music/artist you discovered? If yes, how exactly?
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What is your number one tip to improve your music production or songwriting skills?
I would say that critique from skilled music producers around you is one important factor. A lot of underground producers often sit by themselves and judge their own work in solitude, which is fine in the beginning of your process, but in order to evolve and develop yourself you will need others to judge your work. Basically, seek out people who have good competance within music production and let them give you their feedback on your work. Listen to them and don't be too proud to recieve critique in a respectful way. In order to progress in the right direction we often have to learn from the ones who have walked before us.
Last but not least is practice of course. This is something that goes for everything in life. In order to be good at something you have to commit to it and sacrifice in order to become better. This goes for music aswell. I doubt that I would have had the possibility of making my own music the way I do without my many years learning the piano. It took practice, dedication and sacrifice. Therefore, a combination between humbility and seeking out advice along with practice and dedication are my two most important factors in order to improve yourself.
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What is your best tip for those who struggle with finishing their tracks?
Finishing tracks is a difficult thing for many music producers today. I have known many great producers with incredible projects and ideas that have been lost due to their lack of continous work on it and therefore it remains uncompleted. Which is a shame.
My tip would be to stick to it once your started it and never work on more than 3 projects in the same period. It's very easy to get distracted and move on to new or other projects before you have completed your previous ones. It's very simple, if you start something you have to finish it and many great ideas can be lost and forgotten by not completing them and present them to the public.
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We meet again in one year. What has changed?
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https://www.benalexandermusic.net/
https://soundcloud.com/benalexandermusic
https://www.facebook.com/officialbenalexander/
https://twitter.com/benalexvnder
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Enter your questions to the artist in the facebook comment section below.
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